The sample holding system according to the present invention can be used, in particular, in single plane illumination microscopy (SPIM) which is also known as selective plane illumination microscopy. While confocal laser scanning microscopy is used to scan the sample point by point in a plurality of planes at different depths, from which three-dimensional image data of the sample are subsequently obtained, SPIM technology is based on wide-field microscopy and allows the three-dimensional imaging of the sample based on optical slices through different planes of the sample.
The advantages of SPIM technology are, inter alia, the higher speed at which the images are captured, reduced bleaching of biological samples and a greater depth of penetration of the focus into the sample.
In SPIM technology, fluorophores that are contained in the sample or have been introduced into the sample are, as a rule, excited with laser light which is formed into a so-called light sheet or, rather, which is passed across the sample in such a manner that, in the course of the observation period, the shape of a light sheet effectively results. Using one light sheet at a time, a plane at a certain depth of the sample is illuminated. By means of this illumination, an image of the sample in this particular plane is obtained. An essential feature of this method is that the direction in which the light is detected is perpendicular to or at least at an angle different from zero relative to the plane in which the illumination takes place.